Electric railway signaling apparatus



momma.) o. A. SCOTT; ELECTRIC-RAILWAY SIGNALING APPARATUS.

No. 266,904. Patented Oct. 31, 1882;

N. PETERS. Pham-Lima n lur, wa-hin tun. D. C.

UNITED STATES TENT has CHARLES A. SCOTT, OF BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS.

ELECTRIC RAILWAY, SIGNALING APPARATUS.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 266,904, dated October31, 1882,

Application filed November 23, 1881. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, CHARLES A. SCOTT, of Boston, county of Suffolk,State of Massachusetts, have invented or discovered a new and usefulImprovement in Electric Railway Signaling Apparatus; and I do herebydeclare the following to be' a full, clear, concise, and exactdescription thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings,making a part of this specification, in which-like letters indicatinglike parts- Figurel is a diagrammatic view of a railwaytrackillustrative of the manner of utilizing my present invention; and Figs.2 to 5 are views to an enlarged scale of the electrical appliances, andshowing the same in the different positions or relations which theysustain to each other at different and successive steps of theiroperation.

My present invention relates more particularly to an electricalapparatus for ringing a hell or giving other alarm at any desired pointon a line of railway-as, for example, at a highway or street crossing.While some or all the important features thereof may be advantageouslyused on one or both lines of a doubletrack road, it is chiefly designedfor use on a single-track road; and for this purpose I have so organizedit that, being actuated by the passing trains, it will cause an alarm tobe sounded by a train coming from either direction, so long as the trainis passing from any desired or predetermined distant pointto or acrossthe highway or street or other point to be protected, and also so thatas soon as such point is passed, so that such protection is no longerdesired, the hell or other alarm shall cease to sound. In order to worksuch an alarm on a single track by a train approaching from eitherdirection, a make-and-break mechanism must be employed on each side ofthe crossing and at the proper distance. Now, to prevent an outgoingtrain or a train which has passed thecrossing from ringing the hell byactuating the make-and-break mechanism arranged on that side of thecrossing, and so continuing the alarm after all occasion for it hasceased, I so construct and organize the apparatus that as soon as thetrain shall have passed the crossing or other alarm-point the ringingapparatus will be locked out of operation, except by a following train,and such condition of the apparatus will continue to 6X ist until suchoutgoing train shall have passed the distant make-and-break mechanism onthe side of the crossing in which it is going. The apparatus is thenautomaticallyrestored to its normal condition, and is then ready to heagain actuated for alarm purposes by a train approaching from eitherdirection. Hence I insure the giving of an alarm by a train approachingfrom either direction so long, and only so long, as an alarm is desiredfor protective purposes.

R R represent a portion of asingle-track road on which is astreet-crossing, A, or other point at which an audible alarm is desired.At or in convenient proximity thereto, as at r, I insulate thetrack-rails from each other, and on each side thereof 1 form by theusual electric connections between rails an insulated track-section, R Rsuch sections extending to points at which it is desired that anapproaching train should begin to sound the crossing or other alarm, andat the ends of .such sections I insert the usual insulating material, asat r. At or near such termini I connect the opposite lines of rails bywires 1 2 3 4 with batteries an, as is usual in closed railcircuits. Ator in convenient proximity to the crossing A or other point to beprotected I ar.- range three electro-maguets, c, (I, and e. One, 0, hasits opposite poles connected by wires 5 and 6 with the opposite rails oftheone section R Another, d, is similarly connected by wires 7 and 8with the. section B, and the third, 0, which is the bell-ringing magnet,has a wire, 9,extending from one pole through battery a and thenbranching by one wire, 1.0, to the pivoting-point c of armature-lever 0,and by the other branch, 11, to the pivoting-point d ofarmature-lever d.A wire, 12, leads from the other pole of the bell-ringing magnet e by abranching line to each of two contact-points, s s. The armature-levers cd are furnished with retractile springs 0" (Z and suitable stops, 2 z,are to be added to limit the outward movement of the levers. Theadjacent ends of the levers are made of a hook shape, as shown at i, andthey are so disposed that the hooks may engage each other, as presentlyto be explained. The normal position of the apparatus, there it iscalled, so that the electro-magnet dis no longer under the influence ofthe battery a. Hence the armature-lever d is released, and by the springd its tail end is drawn down till contact is made with s, Fig. 3, and aclosed circuit is then made from s by wire 12,

through magnet 0, wire 9, through battery a wire 11, and armature-lever61. By means of any suitable bell-ringing apparatus and the hell 2; acontinuous alarm is thus caused to be rung at the crossing so long asany part of the train remains on the sectionli; but before the rear ofthe train leaves the section R the forward end of it passes onto thesection R which has the effect to short-circuit the circuit through therails of that section, and relieve the electro-magnet c from the controlof the battery (1.. Hence the armaturelever 0 will be releasedunder thepower of the spring 0 and will drop its tail end forward against the endof the lever d, and with its hook outside the end of d, but withoutreaching the contact 8, the parts being suitably proportioned to thisend, all as represented in Fig. .4. Theapparatus willremain in thiscondition until the rear of the train passes entirely olf the section R,the bell sounding continuously up to this time; but as the train hasthen passed the point to be protected, no alarm is longer required. Thelast wheels and axle having thus passed the point r, the circuit isrestored through the magnet d, so as to attract its armature d; but thetail-piece of such armature', leaving the contact 8, so as to break thebelLr-inging circuit, which has been operative up to this'time, stillremains inside the book of the armature-lever c, Fig. 5, so as toprevent such armature-lever from making contact at s, and from so makinga new bell-ringing circuit while the train is passing over and off ofthe section R As soon as the train entirely clears this section thecircuit is restored through 0, so that the armature-lever c isattracted, as a result of which the hook ends of the armature-levers aredisengaged, and the apparatus goes back to the normal position indicatedin Fig. 2. If a train approaches from the left, as indicated by arrow20, exactly the same operations will take place, butin reverse order. Asthe train enters on section B magnet c will be demagnetized, and itsarmaturelever 0 will go to contact 8, so as to make a closedbell-ringing circuit from s to 9, as before, and then by wire 10 andarmature-lever 0 back to s. The bell will continue to ring until therear of the train shall have left the section R but in the meantime theforward end of the train has cut out the magnet 01 from the influence ofits battery, so that the hook on d is then outside the end of c. Whenthe tail of the train has passed 1 the elect-ro-magnet 0, being then ina closed circuit, causesits armature-lever to clear its contact 8 andbreak the bell-ringing circuit; but, its end being inside the book of d,and the electro-magnet d being demagnetized, such engagement preventsthe latter from making another bell-ringing circuit by contact of d ats, and this condition continues until the train shall have passed offthe section B, after which the apparatus goes again to its normalcondition, as before.

It will be observed that after a train has entirely passed the point r,so that the bell-ringing apparatus is locked as against the action ofthe departing train,itis notlocked as against a train following. Thiswill be seen by reference to Fig. 5. This represents the condition ofthe apparatus with a train off 1t and on B and going in thedirection ofthe arrow to. Suppose it be necessary or important that another I trainshould immediately follow, or that an incoming train or aswitching-engine should come up to or approach A from the samedirection, the short-circuiting of the section It would, as beforedescribed, bring the tail end of lever d back to its contact 8, andrestore or remake the bell-ringing circuit first described, so that thealarm would be sounded and continue to sound so long as any train orpart of a train was on R, whether the section B were occupied or not. 7

So far as I am aware, it is wholly new with me to construct an electricalarm apparatus worked bya train comingfrom either direction until thealarm-point is passed, and no longer, (by that train,) and at the sametime shall be in condition for the sounding of an alarm by a followingtrain, and the same is true of trains going the other way, the devicesoperating in the other order, as above indicated.

Changes and modifications may be made, such as are commonly known underthe heads of mechanical equivalents, colorablevariations, obvioussubstitute,&c.,and the same areincludedherein.Also,byreversingtheconnections and circuit arrangements in such manneras will readily come within the capacity of a man skilled in this branchof the art, a normally-open track-circuit may be substituted for theclosed circuits described, so as by a substantially like operation toperform the same functions, and such modification is hereby includedherein.

I am aware of a prior invention by Oscar Gassett, in which twoelectro-magnets actuating two interlocking armature-levers are employedin such manner that with trains going one way one armature-lever will becaused to drop into contact with the other, and so close a bell-ringingcircuit of which the two armature-levers form a part, and so that thesecond armature lever will then lock the first, so as to eceeoi 3prevent the breaking of the bell-ringing circuit until the point to beprotected has been passed, all three circuits being on the same side ofthe point to be protected, and said apparatus having the further featureof operation that with trains going in the other direction the secondarmature-lever first above referred to will by its action lock the otherin a circuit-broken position, and so prevent the formation of a closedbell-ringing circuit.

Instead of rail-circuits short-circuited as described, wire circuits, orcircuits partly rail and partly wire, with suitable make-and-breakmechanism, may be employed with like results.

I claim herein as my invention- 1. The combination of tworailwaysignalingcircuits, an alarm-circuit split or divided at bothends, and arinature-lcyers locking or engaging each other, substantiallyas set forth.

2. Hook-ended armature-levers c d, in combination with contacts 8 s onan electro-magnetic alarm-circuit, substantially as set forth.

3. The combination of a railway signalingcircuit and electro-magnet onone side of a point to be protected by an audible signal, amake-and-break mechanism arranged on the other side of said point, analarm-circuit and electro-magnet and an alarm to be actuated thereby,and a stop actuated by the armaturelev'er of the track-circuit, by whichto prevent the making of a new alarm-circuit by the makeand-breakmechanism on the other side of the point to be protected, substantiallyas set forth. 4. The combination of an electric alarm, a railwaytrack-circuit on each side thereof, and interlocking armature-levers,either of which is adapted to be worked by a train approaching on onecircuit,- and to be locked out of action by the same train going out onthe other circuit, as against any electric action effected by suchoutgoing train, but free to be actuated from the former circuit,substantially as set forth.

In testimonywhereof I have hereunto set my hand.

' CHARLES A. SCOTT. Witnesses: .7 i

J 0s. P. LIVERMORE, OSCAR Gtssn'r'r.

